Values Voters Focus Newly Realized Power on Future Goals
by Bill Fancher and Allie Martin
November 22, 2004
(AgapePress) - One media expert says while the overwhelming significance of the "values vote" in the 2004 elections came as a surprise to many in the press, it was not the first time people of faith and values have made a difference in American politics. And if a well-known Christian activist has his way, it won't be the last.
Regent University held a seminar last week that examined the impact of religious voters on the recent election. Alliance Press spokesman Tom Frieling was a member of the panel that examined the outcome and implications of the vote. He says when the ballots were counted, perhaps the most shocked segment of American society was the media.
Frieling feels the secular media were fairly oblivious to the values voters' influence, right up until November 2. "The day before the election," he says, "you could ask any member of the media. If you would have asked about the impact of religion, I don't think they would have told you it was that great."
And to this day, the Alliance Press spokesman asserts, many in the media are still trying the negate the impact of religious and moral beliefs on the election. To him this suggests that the mainstream media simply do not understand the core values of the majority of Americans.
"I think some are still in denial, denying that it did play a big role," Frieling says, "but it indeed did. And, you know, this isn't the first time. It's played a large role all the way back to 1980, I feel, with the election of Ronald Reagan."
Most panel members at the seminar agreed that religious voters were galvanized by the moral issues of the day, and therefore turned out on Election Day in huge numbers to wield major influence on the outcome of the presidential race and other votes. Now an outspoken Christian leader is looking to make sure the momentum the values voters have built up will be sustained for years to come.
Falwell's Faith and Values Coalition Launched
Dr. Jerry Falwell founded the Moral Majority in 1979, and many credit that group's activism with helping put Ronald Reagan in the White House in 1980. Now Falwell is hoping a new grassroots organization he recently started will mobilize contemporary believers to play an active role in politics and society. Upon announcing the formation of the Faith and Values Coalition, he pointed out that the organization would have three main goals: the curtailing of judicial activism, the passage a Federal Marriage Amendment, and the election of a socially, fiscally, and politically conservative president in 2008.
Falwell says the Faith and Values Coalition should continue what the Moral Majority started in 1979, by working "to mobilize and inform and activate a huge faith and values contingency in this country -- a voting bloc that will do what they did on November 2 over and over again." In other words, he elaborates, "to put men and women who are committed to the Judeo-Christian ethic in every level of office -- state, U.S. Congress, the White House -- every time."
According to Falwell, as the values voters organize and mobilize to exert their political power, many positive changes could be on the nation's horizon. "New Supreme Court justices can overturn Roe vs. Wade," he says hopefully, and "The Federal Marriage Amendment to the U.S. Constitution can forever define the family as one man married to one woman."
But the well-known minister and conservative spokesman says the re-election of President George W. Bush in 2004 was not due to grassroots activism alone. He asserts that the record turnout of values voters on November 2 can be credited to a combination of factors -- even, in part, to the radical actions of liberal activists.
"So much has happened so quickly during the past four years," Falwell says. "We owe a great debt to four Massachusetts Supreme Court justices who legalized same-sex marriage in the 'People's Republic of Massachusetts.' And we owe a great deal to the mayor of San Francisco, who performed a couple thousand gay marriages, because that fired a shot right over the bow of people of faith in this country."
According to a recent study by the Barna Research Group (http://www.barna.org), although the born-again evangelical population in America stands at 38 percent of the voting population, yet they represented 53 percent of the voters in the recent election. Falwell suggests that the hard push by the left to force the homosexual agenda on the American people may have resulted in the massive values voter backlash that made all the difference in the election.
Falwell has committed to a four-year stint as chairman of the Faith and Values coalition. He contends that the stage is now set for the Church to turn America back to the faith of its forefathers and to the Judeo-Christian ethic.
